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Online scams dishearten beauty seekers
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FANG Fang, a 27-year-old secretary at a German logistics company in Shanghai, was prompted by a WeChat promotion to pursue “the fountain of youth.”
She paid an online agency 1,600 yuan (US$258) recently and was sent to a “doctor’s clinic” in a private apartment to get an injection of hyaluronic acid, which was supposed to improve the appearance of her nose.
The experience left her embittered.
“The effect wasn’t what was promised,” she said. “There was no physical examination nor any questions asked about my health before the procedure. I was told my procedure didn’t work because different individual absorbs the acid differently. The only advice the doctor gave me afterward was to get some rest.”
Money down the drain, she reckons, with no recourse for compensation.
“At least I’m not disfigured,” she said ruefully.
The Internet is full of products targeted at those who want to look younger or more beautiful: anti-wrinkle creams, injections of skin whiteners and lamb placenta extracts, toxin-expulsion massages and mini-plastic surgeries. Online promotions are a haven for scamsters, fake products and false claims that prey on the vain and the gullible.
Websites selling these products claim they are imported from Switzerland or Japan and offer to arrange appointments with “doctors” from China’s mainland, Taiwan or South Korea for treatment. The lack of adequate official oversight often means that products may be toxic and doctors may be unqualified.
“The results are often a long way from the expectations,” said Bobo Chen, who has been in the industry for five years.
Chen used to work for an agency that organized tours for Chinese clients to go to Zurich for treatment with sheep placenta extracts. Now she runs her own business, selling beauty treatments and organizing cosmetic surgery for locals. The margin of profit is sometimes more than 20-fold.
She works with two plastic surgeons from Taiwan — licensed, she says. When one of her Taiwan doctors is in Shanghai for a week, Chen arranges up to 30 procedures.
“Those mini-plastic surgeries on faces are very fast,” she said. “Even if the outcome is not as ideal as expected, it won’t harm people.”
Chen posts her services, plus photos of client successes, on WeChat every day.
“I can’t let my clients forget me, and I have to inspire your potential clients,” she said.
Still, Chen admits that the industry is riddled by fake products and unqualified health personnel. She estimated that about 80 percent of products peddled in the underground beauty markets are fake.
Operators like Chen are able to circumvent customs import laws by shipping in products in small quantities and sometimes by falsifying information on shipping invoices.
“Because these products are classified as medical treatments, they would normally require a long time for inspection and quarantine,” she said. “The percentage of products seized by customs is small compared to the amount of smuggling.”
Inky Ruan, a 25-year-old Shanghai woman, recently bought some “magic” facial masks from South Korea in an online store, believing claims that they would whiten and soften her skin. She was especially impressed by “before and after” photos of celebrities who had presumably used the product.
A few hours after applying a mask, Ruan said her skin started to itch and then became inflamed for several days.
She went to her doctor, who told her she is allergic to some of the chemical ingredients in the mask. Because she works in a luxury brands store where looks matter, she had to stay at home until the inflammation subsided.
Many online sellers use celebrities to hawk anti-aging products.
One of them, who goes by the online moniker K, sells beauty masks from South Korea at 25 yuan apiece. In truth, the masks cost half a yuan to make and come from a factory in the neighboring province of Zhejiang.
K said she can earn up to 40,000 yuan a month selling masks online.
“Although the competition is fiercer than when I started this business six years ago, there is a lot of room to make money in this business,” she said.
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